Why is it not a requirement to enter expiry date of railcard for ticket purchases?

[AlterEgo]

Trip.com clearly saw some value in ignoring the rules. Again.

In my view, holding onto the funds and then pretending it only becomes a new Railcard on the start date doesn't feel in spirit with the spec either.

To me this spec means "you can't give the customer a railcard and forward date it" (impossible to do anyway as railcards don't have a *start* date).

I don't see anything wrong with what Trip.com are doing - buy the railcard now, possibly at a discount, and so you don't forget, and we'll actually deliver it, properly dated, once you buy a discounted ticket with it.

Physical Disabled Railcards come with additional validity, by the way. Mine arrived and was good for use in late July 2024, but expires in mid-August 2027, meaning it is valid for 3 years as paid for, plus two or three weeks. Is that forward dating to you?

 

[Adam Williams]

impossible to do anyway as railcards don't have a *start* date

Of course they do; it's just not displayed to the customer.

I don't see anything wrong with what Trip.com are doing - buy the railcard now, possibly at a discount, and so you don't forget, and we'll actually deliver it, properly dated, once you buy a discounted ticket with it.

How does that comply with the spec?



Are we going to try and argue the purchase has "not successfully completed" until the specified start date? Even though the funds have been taken and the DOB checked?

Physical Disabled Railcards come with additional validity, by the way. Mine arrived and was good for use in late July 2024, but expires in mid-August 2027, meaning it is valid for 3 years as paid for, plus two or three weeks. Is that forward dating to you?

Disabled railcards aren't covered by the spec, nor is the physical fulfilment method

 

[AlterEgo]

Of course they do; it's just not displayed to the customer.

No, they don't. What's the start date of a Disabled Railcard expiring 20 AUG 2025?

How does that comply with the spec?

View attachment 176824

It is available immediately, though, isn't it? It just needs to be activated via a purchase. The spec here is surely saying "if you are selling digital railcards the customer has to be able to get it straight away and you can't take their money and somehow promise delivery or fulfilment later". If I buy a Trip.com railcard, I can access it immediately.

 

[Adam Williams]

If I buy a Trip.com railcard, I can access it immediately.

You can't - they run regular promotions where the Railcard is completely unusable, despite having been purchased, until you perform a follow-up ticket purchase through their app. You can legitimately buy a Railcard, buy tickets from a TVM to use in conjunction with it - and then be unable to access said Railcard.

You are doing real mental gymnastics if you think that that somehow qualifies as "immediately available".

Let's normalise disclosing our own conflicts of interest as well, please. I think I make my own pretty clear on this forum, but it's probably not as apparent to everyone else here that you have a commercial arrangement with Trip.com to promote them.

 

[MrJeeves]

Physical Disabled Railcards come with additional validity, by the way. Mine arrived and was good for use in late July 2024, but expires in mid-August 2027, meaning it is valid for 3 years as paid for, plus two or three weeks. Is that forward dating to you?
[...]
No, they don't. What's the start date of a Disabled Railcard expiring 20 AUG 2025?

This particular discussion is about digital railcards specifically.

Digital Railcards have a start date encoded within the barcode, which you can view on a website such as https://vdv-pkpass.magicalcodewit.ch

 

[AlterEgo]

Let's normalise disclosing our own conflicts of interest as well, please. I think I make my own pretty clear on this forum, but it's probably not as apparent to everyone else here that you have a commercial arrangement with Trip.com to promote them.

I don't - it has expired as of a few days ago, hence me commenting on the company now having never mentioned it before, owing to a conflict of interest. Happy to talk about the negatives too like its interface and confusing daily offers which most Western consumers will find baffling! But I don't think the railcard thing "doesn't meet spec" and do feel it complies with the spirit of it.

Also very happy to disclose the number of times I've supported the forum site and/or Trainsplit - this is the site I use for the day-to-day. Hope you don't feel like I'm kicking the forum site or Trainsplit - not so!

Now a convert to RailUKforums for my ticket purchases!

Until recently joining, really just for advice on delay repay, for which assistance was just great. (THANK YOU ALL!) I had only ever used Trainline for buying tickets However, half hour ago I did a comparison for a hypothetical return trip from Spalding to Lincoln, 2 adults, both senior...

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[lewismachyach]

I don't see anything wrong with what Trip.com are doing - buy the railcard now, possibly at a discount, and so you don't forget, and we'll actually deliver it, properly dated, once you buy a discounted ticket with it.

To be clear, what I was referring to isn't Trip.com's specific discounted railcard offers that require people to "activate" the Railcard by buying a ticket, but rather that there's a choice users are given when purchasing a railcard in the Trip.com app as to when the railcard's validity should start. (Attached screenshots to demonstrate this.) This functionality may or may not be to-spec at all, admittedly. By my amateur reading I would at least suppose it's staying true to the spirit of the "speed of generation/fulfilment" specification that just seems intended to ensure there aren't unexpected delays for the user.

Regardless though, if Trip.com has a working implementation without issues then I'd personally say the rules should be changed to explicitly allow using this feature, or even encourage or require retailers to give the option using Trip.com's implementation, simply as a stopgap until the specification is further changed to provide a better solution. Obviously I recognise that changing the specification isn't at all in the power of any individual retailer.

(It does come across to me as if the specification is just meant to prevent actually issuing a railcard with the encoded 'start date' being a future date, so that retailers don't interface with the Railcard database in that way. Whereas Trip.com's implementation probably just delays issuing the Railcard at all until the 'validity start' date the users specify, the same way they delay issuing their 'special offer' railcards. Because ultimately, beyond this specific method of implementation not being foreseen, I can't see why the specification's writers would object to a retailer implementing this functionality?)

 

[35B]

We didn't implement it because the specification explicitly says you're not allowed to do that.

View attachment 176822

Trip.com clearly saw some value in ignoring the rules. Again.

In my view, holding onto the funds and then pretending it only becomes a new Railcard on the start date doesn't feel in spirit with the spec either.

Personally, I'd suggest the primary problem is with the spec, and the twin decisions (on physical and electronic forms) to not display a "valid from" date and bar future dating of first time railcards. For 16-17, 16-25 and Senior Citizen cards, where the age restrictions mean that a first time user can neither pre-purchase nor buy ahead of use, this creates an unfair trap.

 

[AdamWW]

Personally, I'd suggest the primary problem is with the spec, and the twin decisions (on physical and electronic forms) to not display a "valid from" date and bar future dating of first time railcards. For 16-17, 16-25 and Senior Citizen cards, where the age restrictions mean that a first time user can neither pre-purchase nor buy ahead of use, this creates an unfair trap.

I have to stay I really struggle to see the problem with being allowed to buy a 16-17 railcard before you reach 16.

Does it give you any discounts you don't get by being not 16 yet?

 

[Adam Williams]

I have to stay I really struggle to see the problem with being allowed to buy a 16-17 railcard before you reach 16.

Does it give you any discounts you don't get by being not 16 yet?

No, the obvious answer is to allow it and just ensure the digital railcard cannot be shown on-screen until its start date.

That's not what the spec says though, and we believe it should be amended if forward-dating is to be permitted.

 

[35B]

I have to stay I really struggle to see the problem with being allowed to buy a 16-17 railcard before you reach 16.

Does it give you any discounts you don't get by being not 16 yet?

I quite agree - which is why I'm so focused on the idea that railcards should be seen through the lens of selling additional tickets, not greedy punters depriving the railway of revenue.

More generally, there are 3 railcards that are very speciifcally age related and don't allow early purchase. This, if combined with a "must show railcard before purchase" obligation, creates a fares trap.

If the policy is that people should buy the railcard before travel (cue separate discussion about the purchasing process), then that policy needs to actively consider the impact on people who, quite legitimately, want to be able to pre-purchase travel before they become eligible to use the railcard.

My own preference, on digital or physical railcards, would be for the from and to dates to be displayed clearly.

 

[AdamWW]

No, the obvious answer is to allow it and just ensure the digital railcard cannot be shown on-screen until its start date.

But that then prevents you from showing it to buy a ticket to use after it starts, doesn't it?

What harm does it do if a 15 year old is able to show a 16-17 railcard?

So you can pay half fare until you hit 18, unless it's a ticket you buy before you're 16 but will be 16 when you use it...

Clearly this is different from a railcard with a lower age limit.

 

[Adam Williams]

But that then prevents you from showing it to buy a ticket to use after it starts, doesn't it?

Why should you need to be able to show it's active, as long as the travel date is after the Railcard's start date? You can be allocated the railcard number immediately and I'd suggest that that should be sufficient.

Equally, railcards purchased from TrainSplit that haven't started yet will still be shown in the list.

 

[Railguy1]

Thanks for all the responses. I was ill this week but did read all the posts throughout.

It did not occur to me the number of people who buy discounted tickets for future travel. Nor did it occur to me the number of people buying discounted tickets for family or friends. I did not consider the implications on fraud.

I do think we should always retain flexibility wherever possible. For me, a simple checkbox (1) ”use existing railcard” or (2) “use future purchased railcard or buy for friends and family” would not increase the complexity too much but help a lot of people remember to renew. I think that would retain the majority of the flexibility if not all.

Anyone checking (1) would enter an expiry date (or its details filled in automatically if stored on the app/website if digital) and the system confirm the date is valid. Anyone checking (2) would simply get a message in the basket, telling them they must present a valid railcard when using the ticket. For the vast majority of people, this would be a few seconds extra work and there could be options in the account settings to have one of these checkboxes selected by default.

I vaguely remember reading a comment talking about reminders in emails and texts. I think this is great and a good use of technology. But it is also very easy to see such an email or text, take note and forget about it. So they certainly have their use but I think we could go further, as discussed above.

I guess people will agree to disagree, have better solutions than the above, or remain content with the current system. But my main concern was reading on the forums the number of people who seem to forget to renew and just thinking to myself that surely there could be a few more things done by the industry to make things a little bit easier - even if whatever is done isn’t a perfect solution if such a thing even exists.